


Deserved

by Miso



Series: A War He Can't Forget [18]
Category: SCTV (Canada TV)
Genre: (sort of), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Self-Hatred, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-15
Updated: 2017-08-15
Packaged: 2018-12-15 14:24:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11807784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miso/pseuds/Miso
Summary: Floyd's having a bad time.





	Deserved

**Author's Note:**

> told yall floyd still isnt ok. :c hes got a lot of self-loathing issues to work through. i wanted to explore how being in a relationship, even a happy one, doesnt make mental illness go away. clearly, it hasnt fixed floyd At All. poor guy.

Sometimes, when Floyd was in a low, Earl had to fight the urge to blame himself. _It isn't you,_ every single doctor and therapist had said. _You can't love away a mental illness._ But god, it was so easy to believe that he could. If he just showered Floyd with enough love, enough affection, he'd turn around out of the downward spiral and be okay.

For a little while, it felt like maybe all of the doctors were wrong. Floyd proposed, and suddenly, he was doing better. So much better, in fact, that even people around the studio were noticing, people they didn't talk to on any sort of regular basis. Earl could hear the whispers in the cafeteria, the halls, the edit bays; "Hey, is Robertson in a good mood or is it just me?" and "He doesn't smell like stale whiskey all the time, you think he's doing better?" and "I haven't heard him crying at his desk in a while." Earl caught himself walking through SCTV's hallways with his chest puffed out and his engagement ring in full view of anyone who happened to stroll past, like he was saying "Yeah, I fixed the incredible human trainwreck that was Floyd Robertson."

Then, slowly, Floyd started going downhill again. He sank into the whiskey bottle after keeping himself above water for weeks. He stayed in bed until 3 in the afternoon some weekends, awake but just unable to manage pulling himself out of bed until late afternoon. Earl would wake in the middle of the night to the sound of quiet crying from Floyd's side of the bed, and desperately crave the ability to... what? Love him better? Make all of his hurt go away? What would he do if he could do anything?

One night, when he was jolted awake by Floyd sobbing softly, Earl didn't give away that he was awake. Instead, he just rolled over and sleepily tucked Floyd into his chest, something he'd learned soothed the storm inside him. At least, it used to. That particular evening, it just made him cry harder. Earl almost wanted to cry himself as Floyd wrenched himself out of the embrace and left bed. Pretending to sleep a little bit longer, he couldn't resist the urge to check on him. Earl found Floyd curled into the fetal position on the couch, in tears, staring at his prescription bottles on the coffee table and trembling.

Once he'd seen the bottles were full, Earl went from panic mode to nurturer mode. He pulled Floyd close and stroked his hair and hushed him, gently guided him back to bed, and held him until he eventually dozed back off. He'd mentioned it, offhanded, to Sammy Maudlin the next morning, and gotten a look that he thought was trying for sympathetic but came off as condescending. "Sugar," Sammy had begun, gently laying his hand over Earl's, "Sometimes you gotta take a break from savin' everyone else and try to help yourself."

But he wasn't trying to save him. Was he? He didn't think he was. Earl wasn't out to be a savior to anyone. He just wanted the love of his life to be happy. Was it too much to ask that the man he loved be happy with himself for five minutes? Besides, Earl himself didn't _need_ help. It was Floyd that wasn't okay. Floyd was the one that needed to be helped.

He had to admit, though, it was disheartening to see Floyd's mental health nosedive so harshly. Earl didn't like seeing Floyd cry himself to sleep and lay in bed all day so weighed down by self-loathing he could hardly move.

He especially didn't like waking up in the middle of the night to Floyd's side of the bed empty. Earl sighed quietly and pulled himself from under the warmth of the blankets, wrapping himself in a robe and shoving his feet into slippers to combat the late-autumn cold as he explored the house. "Floyd?" he called hoarsely, scratching his head through the haze of sleep. "Baby?"

The kitchen light was on. He wasn't sure if that was a good sign or not. Trudging down the hall, Earl rounded the corner to spot Floyd, shaking and tear-streaked, fighting with the childproof cap on his Klonopin bottle. "Goddammit, goddammit, open, you piece of shit," he muttered to himself, voice choked with tears. After struggling with the cap for a solid minute, Floyd gave up and tossed the bottle to the ground with a wordless shout of frustration and agony before sinking to the floor, back to the cupboards, sobbing and curling in on himself. Apparently, the fact that the cap had flown off and the pills were now strewn on the floor either escaped him or wasn't concerning him at the moment.

Earl approached as quietly as he could, gently picking up the spilled bottle and replacing the pills into it nearly silently before kneeling before his weeping fiance. "Hey," he whispered, gently placing a hand on Floyd's shoulder. "Baby, what's wrong?" Floyd's sobs intensified, just a little bit louder, as he curled in on himself more. Earl's hand moved from Floyd's shoulder to his hair and he gently brushed a lock of it behind his ear. "Floyd, it's okay. I'm here."

"Leave."

"What?" Earl recoiled a little bit. "I don't-"

"Leave!" Floyd finally jerked his head up, meeting Earl's gaze. His hazel eyes appeared almost forest green thanks to the tears. "Just leave!"

"Why...?"

"I'm just gonna hurt you." Floyd sobbed again and shuddered like the freezing wind outside was cutting through him. "I'm gonna ruin your life. I already have."

"No..." Earl breathed, gently stroking away the tears on Floyd's face. "No, baby, you haven't, I promise." Floyd inhaled sharply and instinctively leaned into the comforting, familiar touch, only to stop himself, grip Earl's wrist, and pull his hand away.

"Don't touch me!" he whimpered, his shoulders jerking with silent sobs. "I... I never should have..." A sob. "Just go."

"Floyd, why do you...?"

"... I... my..." Floyd sobbed again, his voice caught in his throat for a moment. "You had a future." He whimpered. "Y-you... you had a future, and... and then I showed up, and you... you just put everything on hold to help me. And here I am. At square one. Again." He bit his lip. "I ruined your life. Y-you could've been doing something great by now, but you're here in this shithole town taking care of your worthless fiance. And all I did when I proposed was lock you into a relationship you don't need." Floyd turned away from Earl, shaking. "... Dad always said I fucked up everything I tried. Guess he was right." A bitter chuckle and half-smile. "You deserve better. And I don't deserve to be alive."

Earl felt his blood run cold and slowly turned to eye the Klonopin bottle. He hadn't caught Floyd trying to stop a panic attack. He'd caught him trying to kill himself again. "... I don't care if I could be doing something great." Earl bit back tears of his own. "I just... I just want you to be happy. I love you. Is... did I do something wrong?" A quiet whimper escaped him and he mentally cursed himself. "You... you were so happy after we got engaged, and... and now... now you're trying to kill yourself again. Did... is it me?"

"No." Floyd's response was immediate. "It's... I love you. I love you so much." He whimpered. "A-And that's... s'why I want you to go. You're... you can't love me better, Earl." Floyd cast a glance at his prescription bottle. "... And I know you. I know you're going to try and love me better but you can't. Even if I wasn't too fucked up to fix at all, you just... it doesn't work like that."

"Baby..."

"I was happy after I proposed to you because my entire life, I was told I was sick. That no one would love me. I was worthless, useless, a miserable fuck up. But... but then you came along, and you wanted to stay with me forever..." Floyd sobbed. "And... and at first I thought, _thank god, I'm not as awful as everyone says I am._ But then the more I thought about it, I realized... I am that awful. And... all I've done is manipulate you into thinking I'm a good person."

"When did you do that? The second we met?" Earl gently took Floyd's hands in his own. "Because I always thought you were a good person."

"Liar."

"Look, you were... you were cocky and annoying and kind of a brute at first, sure, but... I'm not as stupid as I act." Earl gently stroked his thumbs over the backs of Floyd's hands. "I could see in your eyes that you were hurting. There was something chewing on you inside and I didn't know what, but I know that was why you acted the way you did."

Earl gently let go of one of Floyd's hands to caress his cheek. "You were scared. You didn't want people to get close to you. You were afraid they'd hurt you. So you built up a wall to keep them out, and... the wall was just being a jerk to cover up how afraid you were. But... you let me in. Me, of all people, and... I saw the real Floyd Robertson."

"Yeah. A fucked-up drunk who gets beat by his dad to this day because he's not gonna hit an old man back. Real catch."

"There's a lot more to you than that." Earl kissed Floyd's forehead and pulled him close. "You're smart. You're a talented journalist. You've got this absolutely bone-dry sense of humor that's funnier than pretty much anything else. You're sweet. You love people deeply once you let them in." He gently rubbed small, soothing circles on Floyd's back. "I might not be able to love your problems away, but... but I love you anyway."

Floyd was silent for a moment, nestled into the protective warmth of Earl's embrace. The first thing he thought was _He's just as insane as I am if he loves me this much,_ and the second was _Oh, my god, he loves me that much?_

"... I'm sorry if you think you ruined my life. But you didn't." Earl's lips pressed to the top of Floyd's head. "You're my fiance. I said yes when you proposed because I love you. Not because I feel obligated to make you better or because you tricked me into it. Because I love you, Floyd. Not some made-up version of you that manipulated me into it. The you I know wouldn't do that."

Earl pulled back from the embrace they shared to look Floyd in the eye. "You're not a monster. I promise." He kissed his fiance on the lips gently. "... Are you okay?"

"... I don't know."

"C'mere." Earl stood and gently helped Floyd to his feet. Leading him back down the hall, Earl pulled Floyd into bed with him, then held him as close and tight as he could. "Cry it out, if you need to, okay? I'm here. I'll be here when you're done. Promise."

Quiet. Then a soft whimper, followed by gentle sobs that slowly grew in frequency and volume, until Floyd was bawling into Earl's chest. Round two wasn't quite as harsh as the first, but god, his throat hurt and his chest hurt and his head hurt and his eyes hurt. He just wanted to sleep. Earl's fingers gently stroked through his hair and he heard him whispering gentle reassurances to him. "It's okay, baby. It's alright. I'm here. Let it out." He buried his face in Earl's shirt, tears soaking the fabric. The warmth and scent of the man he loved- the man who loved him- and the gentle thumping of Earl's heart were like being wrapped in a soft blanket.

As his sobs petered out, Floyd clung tight to Earl, trembling and sniffling. "Better?" a gentle voice asked, and Floyd found himself nodding a little bit. He was better. Not by much, but he didn't feel like killing himself. That was a step up, if nothing else. Earl made a soft noise of acknowledgement and kissed the top of Floyd's head. "Good."

Floyd swallowed harshly and nuzzled his tear-streaked face into the crook of Earl's neck. "... Don't leave. Please don't leave."

"I won't. I never will." Earl squeezed Floyd a little closer. "I'll love you until I die. Promise."

Lulled by Earl's heartbeat and breathing, letting his promises to stay spread over him and wrap him in security and warmth, Floyd let his tired, sore eyes drift shut. As his breathing steadied and his muscles relaxed, Earl stroking his hair was the last thing he felt before drifting into a blissfully deep slumber.


End file.
